Wednesday, November 13, 2002 - 01:19 p.m. Pacific
Posted on 11/13/2002 5:43:03 PM PST by JohnathanRGalt
Update on the "Jehad is Crap" operation -- it turns out one of the people on the video tapes was Ujaama. This story keeps getting more interesting.
Wednesday, November 13, 2002 - 01:19 p.m. Pacific
Video shows Ujaama talking about jihad
By Ray Rivera
Seattle Times staff reporter
James Ujaama
A newly released videotape shows James Ujaama, a Seattle man accused of conspiring to help al-Qaida, sitting side-by-side with suspected al-Qaida recruiter Abu Hamza al-Masri and participating in a discussion of jihad.
Ujaama's supporters have downplayed his connections to radical Islam. But the video, shot in a London mosque sometime before the Sept. 11 attacks and after 1999, shows Ujaama, with a thick beard and a reddish brown cap, next to the radical London cleric, who is wanted in Yemen on terrorism charges.
"Sheik Osama bin Laden was framed and forced in isolation, having to leave his own land, his family, and then used as a scapegoat to arrest many Muslims," Ujaama told about 50 men inside London's Finsbury Park mosque.
A former community activist here, Ujaama moved to London and lived with his daughter and wife near the mosque, which under Abu Hamza's leadership has become a fertile recruiting ground for terrorists, according to federal authorities.
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"I was in Afghanistan," Ujaama says on the video, the only known admission to date that he was in Taliban territory. Federal prosecutors have said in court that Ujaama has attended an al-Qaida training camp and on another occasion delivered computers to the Taliban, which was sheltering bin Laden.
But Ujaama's lawyers yesterday said he traveled into the troubled country to drop off laptops at an Afghan girls school.
Ujaama has been held without bail — isolated in a small cell 23 hours a day, with only weekly visitations from family. Yesterday, his lawyers again asked a federal judge for his release on bail but under house arrest, with a monitoring bracelet and no access to phones or computers.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Todd Greenberg argued that Ujaama remained a flight risk and posed a threat to the nation because of his close ties to terror suspect Abu Hamza.
FBI Special Agent Fred Humphries testified about seeing the Ujaama video.
On cross-examination, Ujaama's lawyer Peter Offenbecher asked the FBI agent if he thought Ujaama would pose a threat if he were released under the proposed restrictions, with a global-positioning satellite tracking his every move.
Humphries paused for a long moment, and said: "At this point, I don't think that would occur ... that he would pose any threat."
The testimony by Humphries came over the objections of prosecutors and likely hurts their effort to keep Ujaama in solitary confinement. Sources said federal prosecutors are pressuring Ujaama to provide testimony that would enable the Justice Department to indict Abu Hamza on terrorism charges.
U.S. District Judge Barbara J. Rothstein did not say yesterday when she would decide whether to allow bail for Ujaama.
The video was not played in court yesterday.
In another part of the video, Ujaama declares that Muslim leaders around the world have been framed and wrongly convicted by Christian and Jewish judges and juries. Among his examples were Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, the Muslim convert formerly known as H. Rap Brown who was convicted of killing a police officer in Georgia; Omar Abdel-Rahman, the blind sheik convicted in 1995 of conspiring to blow up various New York City landmarks; and Osama bin Laden.
At one point, Ujaama turns to Abu Hamza and adjusts the microphone for the cleric, who lost his hands while making a bomb in Bosnia, the FBI said.
The owner of the videotapes, who lives in England, said yesterday that the tape of Ujaama and Abu Hamza was taken in an upstairs room of the Finsbury mosque. He asked not to be identified.
He said he received the tapes about six months ago from Abu Hamza after telling him that he wanted to start a Web site similar to Abu Hamza's radical "Supporters of Shariah," which calls for violent overthrow of the West.
Until the video surfaced, evidence of any Ujaama trips to Afghanistan and his ties to Abu Hamza largely consisted of testimony of captured militants in Afghanistan and Guantánamo Bay and from people who attended a Seattle mosque with Ujaama.
Defense attorneys had not seen the videotapes yesterday. But they were pleased with Special Agent Humphries' remarks.
"And after considerable thought, some soul searching, it is his opinion of Mr. Ujaama that he is not a threat to the community," said Offenbecher, Ujaama's lawyer.
Ujaama's trial is set for June 2.
Staff reporters Mike Carter and David Heath contributed to this report.
Ray Rivera: 206-464-2926 or rayrivera@seattletimes.com.
Al Qaeda Recruitment Videos Placed on Web
Fanatic Sheikh's Videos of Terror
Jehad is Crap
But wait, I thought the Taliban didn't allow females to get an education. Hmmmmm
Then the state of Oregon can let him jihad all the big buck cockroaches in the state pen.
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Under the Taliban, there were no girl's schools. Girls were not allowed to be educated. And in that country, just where would they get the electricity to power the laptops? It wasn't available except to those who ruled the place.
Ujaama took the laptops to Afghanistan for use by the Taliban and/or al Qaeda.
Ron Sims, King County, Wash. executive and the highest-ranking African American elected official in the state, echoed the declaration publicly. Of Ujaama and his younger brother, Mustafa, Sims said: "These two gentlemen are community activists, not terrorists." Larry Gossett, a black King County councilman added: "Both of these cats have had a positive, contributing role in the African American community here."Useful idiots.
Dupes of al-Qaeda.
Friends of James Ujaama
Ujaama is not being logical. It's obvious that Abu ("Who-Hazma-Hands?") Hazma is both a leader and a criminal.
Sounds like a serial shoplifter rather than a bomb maker.
They contacted me.
Nice 'religion'.
Doesnt this statement alone prove he is a liar? Girls School during the rule of the Taliban?
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James Ujaama, a Seattle man accused of conspiring to help al Qaida, discusses